Last Days (2014)

Directed by

Kathryn Bigelow

Genre

documentary film

Country

United States

Runtime

4 min

Rating

7.6 of 10 from 10 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

This short documentary connects the illegal ivory trade to terrorist funding. It uses footage from a shopping mall attack to argue that poaching supports militant groups. The film focuses on the decline of African elephant populations.

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What happens

Last Days is a 2014 American animated short documentary film about the decline of African elephant populations and the illegal ivory trade. It was directed by Kathryn Bigelow and written by Scott Z. Burns. Featured in the film is footage of the 2013 Westgate shopping mall attack in Nairobi, Kenya, which has been attributed to the militant organization Al-Shabaab. The film advances the claim that terrorist networks derive much of their income from poached ivory. These claims, which were similar to ones made by several public officials including former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, UK Foreign Secretary William Hague, and Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, were based on a 2013 report by the environmental nonprofit Elephant Action League (EAL). However, a report published jointly by Interpol and the United Nations Environment Programme described EAL's findings as "highly unreliable". According to the report, Al-Shabaab's primary income comes from the trade in charcoal, a significant source of deforestation. The world premiere of Last Days was held at the New York Film Festival on September 27, 2014. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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• Racing Extinction (2015)
• Ivory. A Crime Story (2016)
• Earthlings (2005)
• Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret (2014)
• Ivory Hunters (1990)
• An Apology to Elephants (2013)
• Virunga (2014)